Saudi Arabia sees Ukraine as leading country in agricultural sector
2011-12-28 11:46:27
Saudi Arabia sees Ukraine as a leading country in agricultural production and is also interested in the development of military and technical cooperation with Ukraine. This issue was discussed at meetings between Ukrainian Foreign Minister Kostiantyn Hryshchenko and senior officials of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia during his official visit to the country on December 26-27, the press service of the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry has reported.
"At a meeting with the agriculture minister, the Saudi side showed an extraordinary interest in the development of cooperation in agriculture, stressing that it sees Ukraine as one of the leading countries in this area," the press service reported, while commenting on the results of a meeting between Hryshchenko and Minister of Agriculture of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Fahd Balghunaim.
The Ukrainian foreign minister also had a meeting with Defense Minister of Saudi Arabia, Prince Salman bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud, during which the parties stressed the interest in the development of military and technical cooperation and discussed a number of regional security problems. The two also exchanged views on pressing issues of international relations.
In general, during the minister's official visit, special attention was paid to the discussion of issues of economic partnership. Hryshchenko held a number of meetings with the ministers of the economic section of the Saudi Arabian government, in particular, with the minister of transport, a co-chair of the Ukrainian-Saudi intergovernmental commission on trade-economic and scientific-technical cooperation, Jabara bin Eid Suraiseri, and Minister of Public Utilities Mansour Al Saud.
The sides noted the positive trends in recent years with regard to the continued growth in trade turnover between Ukraine and Saudi Arabia, and they also said that today there were all grounds for its substantial increase and for the diversification of the structure of bilateral trade.
The Ukrainian foreign minister noted the great attention of the Ukrainian leadership to the improvement of the investment climate and stressed the country's interest in promoting investment cooperation with Saudi Arabia.